Khirbat Beit Kufa

Orit Segal

30/07/2006

Final Report

During January 2001 a trial excavation was conducted on the lower southern hillside of Khirbat Beit Kufa, next to Moshav Bet Nehemya (Permit No. A-3368*; map ref. NIG 19650/65350; OIG 14650/15350), to examine an ancient rock-cutting that was exposed by Y. Elisha while inspecting probe trenches dug in preparation for the construction of the Cross-Israel Highway. The excavation, on behalf of the Antiquities Authority and financed by the Cross-Israel Highway, was directed by O. Segal, with the assistance of S. Ya‘aqov-Jam (administration), A. Hajian (surveying), T. Sagiv (photography) and T. Kornfeld (drafting).

A rock-cutting, almost square in shape, was exposed (Fig.1). Bedrock was revealed at a depth of c. 0.5 m below surface in the northern part of the rock-cutting and it appears to have been used for quarrying (L100). The southern part of the rock-cutting was cut deeper, thereby creating a rectangular courtyard with an entrance to a burial cave, set in each of its short sides (L101). The entries were sealed with hard limestone closing stones, which were not identical. The western one was flat with an arched top (Fig. 2) while the eastern one resembled an inverted trapezoid (Fig. 3). The quarrying of the courtyard was incomplete. Whereas its western wall (1.2 × 2.2 m) was clearly hewn to the floor, the eastern wall was narrowed to a width of 0.6–0.9 m. The courtyard was not quarried to its full depth and no other tombs were installed in the northern part.

The burial chambers were not excavated, but the pottery gathered from the fill in the courtyard was homogenous and included body fragments of cooking pots and jars. Many of the jar fragments had a thin ridge at the base of the neck, characteristic of the Early Roman period. Neither bones nor vessels were found in situ on top of the courtyard floor and therefore, it is likely that once the tombs were sealed with the closing stones, the burial complex was no longer used, as also evidenced by the incomplete hewing of the courtyard and its reuse as a quarry.

Khirbat Beit Kufa was surveyed in the past (Map of Lod [80], Site 145) and potsherds from the Byzantine and Early Islamic periods were collected. Roman potsherds and burial caves (Site 77, unpublished) were discovered at the site during the survey that preceded the construction of the Cross-Israel Highway. It therefore seems that the courtyard and the burial caves belonged to the site, but could probably be associated with the burial complex exposed at the nearby Tel Hadid, which had a burial sequence from the Iron Age until the first century CE (ESI 19:44*–46*).